Claude Debussy seems to typify the mood and culture of France at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. His evocative Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune echoes the sultry pagan woodland scene of Mallerme's poem of that name, while La mer shows the varying moods of the sea as the sun rises in the sky, the waves sport, and wind and sea converse. The Nocturnes are equally delicate and nuanced in their depiction of clouds, a holiday celebration, and the final, seductive sirens of the mysterious sea.